Chicago man sentenced for terror plot

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CHICAGO — A Chicago man was sentenced Tuesday to nearly 10 years in prison for plotting to attend a Somalia training camp with dreams of becoming a suicide bomber for Al Qaeda and another terrorist group, al-Shabab.

Shaker Masri, 29, was sentenced two years after his arrest, which relied heavily on an FBI informant. He pleaded guilty in July to trying to provide material support and resources to a terrorist organization. He declined to make a statement in court Tuesday and showed little emotion as US District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman announced the sentence.

The Alabama-born Masri allegedly discussed the possibility of killing a busload of US soldiers and about the ‘‘heavenly rewards one would receive for martyrdom,’’ according to a government presentencing filing.

Investigators also found copies of extremist literature on Masri’s computer, including Osama bin Laden’s 1996 manifesto, ‘‘The Declaration of War Against the Americans.’’

‘‘Shaker Masri did not simply want to offer himself as a soldier to fight in the ranks of a terrorist militia engaged in a bloody civil war, he wanted to die killing others,’’ the presentencing filing said. ‘‘Masri’s goal was to be a tool of indiscriminate murder.’’

Masri also allegedly expressed admiration for Anwar al-Awlaki, a US-born cleric who is believed to have inspired the 2009 Fort Hood, Texas, shooting rampage and the attempted bombing of a jetliner approaching Detroit on Christmas Day in 2009.

The plea agreement set a recommended prison term of just under 10 years.